She pounded her fists into the stuffed, armored dummy, aiming for all the sensitive spots on the human body. Dressed in a tight yellow tank top and black shorts with black gloves instead of gauntlets on her hands, she was in the training room of Beacon Academy. Her skin was slick with sweat and her hair, tied back in a high ponytail, was sticking to her forehead.
The training room was mainly dark, with only a third of the lights on, one shining directly onto her as she pummeled the dummy, grunting with effort.
She paused for a moment, her breath coming in ragged gasps as she glared furiously at her target, her eyes flaring red.
Curfew at the Academy had long since past, and she knew it.
She didn't care.
"Who are you?" she demanded.
"I'm no one," the dark haired woman standing before her replied coolly.
"Obviously you're someone," she snarled, clenching her fists. She was tired, she was scared (he girl with the odd-colored hair on the train that had very nearly killed Yang had fled at the sight of this woman; she was evidently someone to fear), and she was angry. She did not have patience for this.
"No one important," the woman deflected calmly. "You, however, are extremely important."
She could either take her raging emotions out on her teammates or to take it out through physical exertion in the training room. Not only was taking it out on her teammates unfair, but it revealed weakness. She, the bold blond brawler who joked and laughed and seemed untouched by anything, could feel pain. She hurt and felt angry and upset and betrayed. She was nervous and weak and selfish.
And her team couldn't see that side of her.
The woman, undeterred by the girl's flaming red eye, breathed, "Yang Xiao Long." She smiled softly as if she had been testing out the word and found it sounded perfect. She took half a step forward and Yang clenched her fists. "You're..." the woman gave a breathy laugh, shaking her head in awe, "...so beautiful."
She had to be strong for her team. She had to be strong for her friend. She had to be strong for her partner. She had to be strong for her sister.
Especially for her sister.
She began to pound into the armored dummy again, letting her emotions pour out into the crashing and the pounding, and a single angry cry ripped from her throat as she threw punch after punch until her knuckles were sore and scraped.
"How do you know me?" she snapped. "And why do you look so much like me?" Yang was tired of cryptic answers. She wanted the truth and she wanted it now.
The woman gave a half-hearted chuckle. "Yang Xiao Long, I think it's you that looks like me."
"Who are you?" the blonde demanded. "How in Remnant do you know my name?"
"I already told you, I'm no one."
Yang clenched her jaw. "How. Do you know. My name?" she growled, hair flaming in fury at the last words.
The woman's even voice never faltered. "How could I not?"
She was breathing heavily as she leaned against the dummy, her left arm draped around it. She gave a few more weak punches with her right hand at the dummy's stomach, smearing the armor with the blood dripping from the torn skin of her knuckles.
The anger wasn't gone, but it had been subdued, engulfed in exhaustion. She gulped in a breath, and as she gave a shuddering exhale, the tears she had fought so hard to keep down escaped as the exhale turned into a sob. The noise echoed faintly through the dim training room, muffled slightly by the training dummy's shoulder.
"Please," Yang started, trying for a different approach. Her voice sounded on the brink of desperate. The woman gave her a curios look. "I have to know who you are."
The woman looked away uncomfortably. She put on a fake grin, looking back at Yang Xiao Long. "I thought you'd have more fire than that."
Yang glared. "Well, sorry, but almost dying kind of takes the fire out of someone."
"Maybe, but you're different, Yang Xiao Long. You're stronger than you think."
"How would you know?" she demanded.
"I know more about you than you think."
With the anger dissipated, there was nothing to stop the tears as they streaked down her face. Instead, a heavy feeling of betrayal pressed down on her, a feeling she tried to push away. She didn't want to feel betrayed. She didn't want to give that woman the ability to hurt her, not anymore, but it was far too late for that. That right had been given to her years ago, before the girl was even old enough to understand how badly that ache could hurt.
"How?" Yang cried. "How do you know? Are you some weird stalker or a creeper or some-some psychopath?" she demanded shrilly and the woman winced. "You-"
"Your mother."
Yang's frantic pleas and insults froze. Her heart stopped and her eyes shifted back into their lilac hues for a moment. "My...?"
The woman had her head ducked as if flinching away from the blonde. Her expression seemed as if the words had been ripped from her. She gulped. "You're... my daughter," she breathed.
She turned, leaning against the dummy as she slid to the floor. She pulled her knees up to her chest, wrapping her arms around her legs a s if holding herself together. The Huntress bit back a sob, resting her head on her knees and clenching her jaw.
She didn't want to cry. She didn't want to hurt. She wanted to pick herself up and smile. To joke and laugh and grin and tease and be the girl everyone knew, the one everyone saw, the part of her that was strong and happy and whole.
But in the darkness and the silence and the loneliness, surrounded by nothing but dagger-sharp memories and feelings, the girl they knew was gone.
"You're..." Thought couldn't process in Yang's mind. This was the woman she had been searching for? The one who had haunted her, night after night as she lay awake in bed with a storm of emotions raging inside her that she never gave the ability to reveal themselves? This woman... was her?
"Yang Xiao Long, please, you have to know that I-" the woman cut off, ducking her head and averting her gaze. "You have to know that... that I didn't want anything to hurt you," she breathed, obviously having changed her choice of words.
The numb shock was suddenly replaced with angry hurt as her eyes flared like hot coals. "You hurt me!" Yang cried, feeling tears well up in her bright red eyes.
The woman looked at Yang, her expression desperate and upset. "Yang-"
"No! You betrayed me!"
The woman hung her head. In a quiet voice, she said, "No, I didn't betray you. To be betrayed, you have to love. You don't love me."
"You're my mother," Yang said, and the words felt strange to her. "Of course I loved you."
Immediately, the dark haired woman countered, "You loved the idea of me. You can't love someone you've never met."
She wanted to destroy something. To beat the Dust out of anything, anyone, do everything she could to stop this flood of agony. She wanted to scream and curse and roar. She wanted to demand answers from any higher power-Oum, Luna, Shawcross, or whatever other god there was in Remnant that would listen. She wanted to leave Beacon behind and lose herself in pounding music and harsh drinks and crashing bodies. She didn't want to know anything anymore. She wanted to forget, forget everything-forget Taiyang Xiao Long, forget Summer Rose, forget her team, forget the Academy, forget her responsibilities, her past, her present, her future, all of it.
She wanted to forget Raven Branwen.
"You abandoned me!" Yang roared, fists clenching as she fought down tears.
"I didn't," Raven replied, though her even voice seemed tinged with guilt, and it only made Yang's temper flare. "Not really. I saw you grow up, and-"
"Without you!" Yang shouted.
"You lived just fine without me," Raven said quietly, eyes looking away.
"I lived just fine?" Yang repeated, voice rising. "I was eight! Raising a six-year-old without any help!" Yang yelled, watching the words cut into Raven. Thoughts of her sister filled her, and her voice dropped, quivering with guilt, eyes fading into lilac as she looked away. "I-I almost lost her..." Yang clenched her eyes shut, and when the locked on Raven once more they returned with a fiery intensity that reflected the heated suffering within her. "And it's because of you!"
"I didn't tell Taiyang to tell you the truth!"
"You wanted him to lie to me?" Yang demanded.
"Only until you were old enough to understand!" Raven insisted.
"I was old enough to accept the woman who raised me was never coming back! I was old enough to watch my father give up on life! I was old enough to raise a kid! I was old enough to know the truth!" Yang snapped.
"And the truth almost cost you your life! And your half-sisters'!" Raven snapped coldly.
The title Raven gave Ruby, though it was true, stabbed Yang like a knife. She clenched her fists. "If you hadn't left, I wouldn't have had to go after you!"
"I didn't force you to come looking for me!"
"You weren't there to stop me!" Yang yelled, tensing to strike the woman, regardless how dangerous she was.
"If I had been, Ruby Rose would never have been born!"
She tipped her head back, struggling for breath. The room was hot, all the windows shut, and the heat from her exertion crashed on her in waves. She never seemed to be bothered by the cold-her Semblance had always kept her warm-but she hated being too hot. It felt like she were suffocating, and her ragged gasps weren't giving her enough air. She considered leaving the training room, but there was more chance she would be caught after curfew within the hallways of Beacon, and the last thing she needed tonight was detention.
Yang's fury tempered at the thought of her sister and her muscles seemed to fail her. Once they had lost Summer, Ruby had been her whole world. Yang had fought for her more times than she could count. Yang's sole purpose in life had been to succeed where two mothers and a father had not-protect her family. Protect her sister. She had trained to strengthen her mind and her body, not only in hopes to make her parents proud, but to be better able to defend Ruby.
Yang clenched her jaws. "Seventeen years."
Raven flinched.
"Seventeen years," Yang repeated, enunciating the words. "You've had seventeen years to talk to me," she said, voice rising momentarily before lowering once more. "Why now?"
"I-I..." Raven appeared to be at a loss for words. "I...I wanted you to know me."
"I could have known you years ago!" Yang countered. "Where were you when Summer died? Where were you when Uncle Qrow rescued us?"
"I-"
"No! I don't want to hear it! I don't care what you were doing! I just... I..." Tears threatened to overflow as Yang ducked her head, clenching her eyes shut. Her voice shook with emotion. "Why?"
"I don't know!" Raven cried finally. "I don't know..." She let out a breath, trying to compose herself. "I...I tried to keep tabs in you, tried to make sure you didn't bite off more than you could chew a-and then I saw Neopolitan and... I thought...I thought that... I thought I was going to lose you again!" she breathed her voice tormented.
She gulped down a few breaths, her face damp with sweat and tears. Her fists were clenched so tight the knuckles were turning white below the scraped skin and blood, and her nails were cutting into the palm of her hand. The metal post the dummy was mounted on felt cool on the burning skin of her back, and she pressed herself against it, wincing.
"But why are you here?" Yang demanded in a harsh tone. "Why are we having this conversation?"
"I-"
"You've gone my whole life without speaking to me. Why now?"
"I told you, I-"
"No, you told me why you saved me. Not why you're finally speaking to me!" she snapped, voice rising and dripping with venom.
"I want to fix things!" Raven cried. Her hands gestured desperately at the space between them, taking half a step forward. "I want to fix this!"
"And you think this is the answer?" Yang demanded sharply. "Oh hey! Hooray! You're not dead! Oh, and guess what? I'm your mom! Yeah, I've kind of been around for a while, even after I ditched you, but hey, I'm here now!" she mocked.
She clenched her jaw, trying to cut off the sobs. No crying, no tears, be strong, be strong!
The tears wouldn't stop.
"I don't want you here," Yang said in a solid, cold voice. Her eyes were a hard shade of red, locked on Raven's own. The blonde gulped, seeing the hurt reflected in the woman's gaze and she almost wavered, but the pain was too familiar a sight-one she had seen so many sleepless nights, looking back at her from her own reflection. She had seen echoes of the agony in her father's eyes, dulled by whiskey, many times years ago, and only once seen it in Ruby's silver eyes as they both took in the sight of the familiar white cloak, torn and bloodied and empty, swaying limply in Taiyang's arms as he trudged through the red-tinged snow.
She could stay here until dawn. She most likely would. Her sister would tell the others that she was fine, that she did this all the time, that she'd text if she was in trouble, that they shouldn't worry. They wouldn't come looking for her.
Raven glanced wildly around. "I-I have to go."
An unreasonable hurt and anger flooded through Yang. "You're leaving again?"
"I-I'll find a way to contact you," Raven stammered.
Yang shook her head, wincing slightly. "No, just... Just leave me alone."
"Yang-" Raven started.
"Just go."
"I-" she began again, but Yang cut her off.
"Go! Just go. I don't need you to pretend you care about me."
Raven looked at her, her eyes silently begging her to understand. In a quiet voice, she said, "I do care, Yang Xiao Long."
"If you cared," said Yang, "you wouldn't leave again."
"If I didn't care," Raven countered softly, "I wouldn't have saved your life, Yang Xiao Long. I wouldn't be here right now."
Yang didn't answer.
Raven took half a step forward, her arm raising slightly as if she were reaching out to her daughter, but then she retreated, her arm falling back to her side. "I will contact you, Ynag Xiao Long."
Yang stayed silent, her eyes closed.
Raven took a step back, beginning to turn away. Yang felt wind blow through the courtyard and she opened her eyes.
She was laying in her bed in the Team RWBY dorm room, the window open with a cold breeze blowing peaceful night air into the room, the shattered moon casting a pale, fractured, glowing pool of white through the curtains and spilling onto the floor below.
She sat there, collapsed against the training dummy, without any energy too move from her place. She was confused, afraid, and alone. an idea flitted against her mind.
She was born a fire, and a fire unguarded becomes an inferno, but without anything left to fuel itself, it dwindles down to nothing but ash. She was a flame, left unattended.